How to Reach (Vietnam)

Flights

Flights are the only way of how to reach Vietnam. Significantly, we have direct flights operating between India and Vietnam. Most of the direct flights from India arrive at two major cities of Vietnam: Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City. It takes about 4.5 hours from India to reach Vietnam. Although there are flights to other locations like Da Nang, they are not direct. Consequently, they take more time to reach with added hassle of transit. Kolkata being the nearest airport has cheapest and shortest flights. Indigo offers both direct flights to and from Kolkata to Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City and with check-in luggage.

`VietJet & Air Asia offer budget flights from India to all cities of Vietnam. The only drawback is that them being economy airlines do not include check in baggage in its ticket. Nevertheless, you can always buy luggage from their website, it does not cost too much. Air Asia has layovers at Kuala Lumpur or Bangkok with self transfer option. Do check for the conditions before booking your ticket. Booking 2-3 months prior to your travel date will get you good deals.

Visa

The next most important step in how to reach Vietnam is its VISA process. Vietnam is not visa free for Indians. You need a visa to enter Vietnam. The cost of visa is only $25 which translates to about ₹2125 on exchange rate of $1 = ₹85. There are two types of Visa that the Indian tourist may avail to enter Vietnam:

• Visa on arrival
• eVisa

Visa on arrival

For visa on arrival, firstly,AA you need to get a visa approval letter which is an authorized document to confirm your eligibility for visa on arrival. We are attaching a sample approval letter in this post for your convenience. You require your scanned passport size photo with white background and scanned image of your passport to apply for the visa approval letter through the official visa website. Please mention a valid email address to make things easier. It will take maximum 3 days for approval.

After successful processing, you will get a visa approval letter on your registered email from Vietnam’s immigration department. Finally, you need to take a printout of this letter and present it at the arriving airport immigration to get the visa stamping done on your passport. This will cost you $25 only payable at immigration. But, it takes too much time if a number of flights arrive simultaneously.

e-Visa

In order to obtain the e-Visa you require the same documents and need to follow the same process on the website mentioned above. On the website, select e-Visa option, fill the details, upload your scanned photo and scanned image of passport and make the payment of $25 on the payment link using any of international Master/Visa/Amex card. Try to use a Visa credit card for more probability of success. You will be provided a user id and a password to track your Visa status on the website. If everything is good, you will receive your e-Visa on your email or you can download it from the website using the login details within 2-3 days from the date of application.. It is advisable to obtain e-Visa for a tension free trip. Sample e-Visa is as under:

Caution

Beware as there are many travel mediator websites (even with the extension “.govt.vn”) who offer you visa through their websites. Even when you search for Vietnam visa many of these websites pop up before the official Vietnam government immigration website for visa applications. They facilitate you getting a visa through the same government website but cost almost the double rate for it, while giving no breakup of the charges at the payment page. They mention some scary things about your visa application getting rejected or express services etc. to coax you into paying more. But, remember, the visa process is completely online and very simple, taking less than a week for processing. Therefore, avoid these scams. To visit the official Vietnam government immigration website for visa click here.